What mic for this situation
 

I have another thread running on the possibility of using a mic for both indoor and outdoor situations, but it looks like that's not ideal, so I will zero in on a more specific question.

We are doing a small-time video series. It will be a cozy living room scene (fireside chat-type) where an adult is reading/telling stories to two kids on either side of him/her. All three are on the couch during the story-time.

I want to know which mic is best for this indoor scenario. There will not be much movement other than jittery kids moving around on the couch, but no getting up and walking around, etc.

I want a mic that I can mount on a boom (without a sound guy). I would like to get the mic located in the proper place and not worry about it during the shoot. I want to be able to point it to the location and pick up sound from all three.

I was going to put the adult talent telling the stories on a wireless lav, but would that even be necessary? Would the overhead boom/mic combo do the trick?

BTW, I keep referring to an overhead boom assuming this is the proper setup, but if there is something better, certainly let me know! :) Thanks.

A boom mic usually can only work on one person at a time. There's really no way I can see that you can fly ONE mic over such a group and get good results on all parties. If the kids are sitting very close together, a lav on the adult and a boomed hyper aimed at the two kids might work out. I can see the kids on the floor in front of the fire shoulders touching and the adult sitting in a chair reading to them.

You need a sound guy (or gal). There is no such thing as set-and-forget location recording. You wouldn't dream of doing that with the camera ... what makes you think the sound needs any less constant attention throughout the scene? (Sorry, I don't mean that to sound confrontational, just suggesting a reality check is in order.)

I can't have a sound guy. So what's the next best thing? Lavs on all three? No set-and-forget, but what about clip-and-forget?

If you run multiple mics, do you have a recorder? or will you be running more than one camera? you could conceivably use three wired lavs if they are not going to leave the chair, you would need a way to record three simultaneous mics.

Maybe this is a response for another thread, but I DO have a recorder. It's a Digidesign 003 Rack which I use for my audio studio work. I assume that COULD work, and I'd just need to sync up the audio with the video, right? A problem I foresee with this is I record video to disc, so recording WAV audio and video together could be too much for my computer. I never thought of using these together...

This is what I have http://www.digidesign.com/index.cfm?...26&itemid=5028

The only problem is I wouldn't know how to get it compressed back from WAV to import into Adobe Premiere...

Would something like this work?

I am not familiar with that unit, but assuming you get the audio into premiere, if you use a mic on the camera, you could then reference from that audio to the recorders audio visually. of before you record, use something like a clicker, so you can both see and hear something as a cue.

"Can't have a sound guy" What does THAT mean? Why can't you have a sound guy?

Lavs on all three won't work because you only have two tracks of audio and putting two lavs on one track is a big problem.

If you want to pull your 003 and out each lav on a separate track and mute or reduce the off mics sounds, that might work, but it's a lot of effort

A boom with a cardioid MAY work, but a LOT depends on the actual volumes of the people speaking and the acoustics of the room.

An auto mixer is also an option. AT and Shure make them.

Regards,

Ty Ford

For the same reason I can't have a Ferrari Enzo--as much as I would like to have both. This is going to be an ongoing shoot (once or twice a week for a year), so I'd like to see it be a setup that can be ongoing and somewhat self-sustaining with minimal behind the scenes staff. As it is now, the current "staff" consists of my immediate family! :) They're the only ones willing to do this for free! HA!

Perhaps the mixer is the best option at this point. I see your point with the Digi 003 being somewhat of a pain.

I just need a solution to get 3 peoples' voices into one camera.

1. Three lavs + a mixer?
2. One mic on a boom?
3. Three lavs + Digi 003 to computer?

I can't think of anything else, that's why I'm reaching out for suggestions. Surely there's a solution out there.... I thought it was the "right" mic + a boom.

Lloyd,

OK try this. You have three people to light and shoot, side by side.

One's a fair skinned blonde, one's an oriental, one's a very dark skinned black person. How do you light the shot?

Voices can be like complexions. That's why one mic may not work very well.

Regards,

Ty Ford

I know you do this as a professional for a living, and I'm getting into this as a fun hobby only. So if I understand you correctly, you're really saying get three different mics since everyone's voice is different? Therefore three mic guys? (Am I jumping to conclusions?)

You, like most professionals in their trade, want it 100% right. I, doing this as a hobby, am satisfied with 95% right. I know the percentages are subject to interpretation, but I think you get where I'm going with this. I'd even take a 90% on your scale since I see how careful you are in your work. (Isn't 90% still an "A" at most schools?)

No. I'm saying three mics on three people to two channels of a video camera will suck.

Ty Ford

Here's your auto mixer. This would be perfect! Works for free and doesn't complain, either:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...ica+mixer&ci=0

And here's the 4-channel and 8-channel from Shure:
http://www.bhphotovideo.com/bnh/cont...arch&Q=*&bhs=t

One of these would probably work out fine. Just put a lav (ECM-44?) on each person and go.

If they are sitting next to each other and aren't whispering, a cardioid should be fine, maybe favor the kids if they are more quiet, Just monitor it, if it sounds fine on headphones then it should be fine on tape. just my 2 cents,

Why not stick a lav on the story teller, monitor it on cans and see if the kids come across on it ok. If they are close by they will be picked up quite well if they speak up.

Stick a mic out on a floor stand as a back up and chuck that on the other track.

If your lav is free from clothing rustle and being knocked, compress it in the mix and hopefully the kids will be loud enough. If they are small and close to the grown up they should be on mic ok.

Oh and as for getting 90% that is optimistic. Most lay people would in my opinion be lucky to get 40%. Pro's struggle to get over 80%. Sound is NOT easy.

Could you elaborate on this a bit? Is it a problem because you can't separate the voices or is there a technical reason that it won't sound good or is it something else? Thanks.

I think he meant that putting three lavs on one track (1 for L, 1 for R) is hard without a mixer.

But along this same line, I assume that 3 lavs + a mixer (E44?) would be fine? You take the 3 lav lines, combine them into one track and output them XLR inputs on the camera. I assume this is a solution to my "can't have a mic guy" problem, isn't it?

3 lavs, one mixer, into one camera, job done... ?

Not quite. The problem is a given speaker is being picked up by more than one microphone at a time. When the mics are fairly close together, the two signals have a very slight time delay between them, making them slightly out of phase with respect to each other. When you mix them to the same channel, you produce a phenomenon known as 'comb filtering' as the two waveforms combine with each other to selectively reinforce some frequencies while cancelling out others, leading to a very unnatural sounding result. It's the same sort of beat note thing you get when you hit two side-by-side keys on the piano at once. The rule of thumb is that when person 1 is speaking, any mic you combine with the signal coming off of the mic closest to that person must be at least three times farther away from them. So if the closest mic is 1 foot from the speaker's mouth, any mic whose signal you want to mix with it must be at least 3 feet away from the speaker. Then even though that takes care of the comb filtering issue, you still have to deal with the echo effect as the closest mic gets the speech first and then the second gets the same sound but with an audible delay. Mixing multiple lavs can be done but it's not a trivial exercise.

Hmm. I see what you mean. Then what about changing the set configuration slightly. Instead of the two kids sitting so close together, perhaps their sitting around a small coffee table with a good 3-4 between each other. Or maybe not a coffee table... whatever.... just get configure the layouts so that there is 3-4 feet between everyone... maybe they're on beanbags..... I can work on making it look right later, but I need to know the logistics if it is even going to work.

Three people, 3-4 feet apart, all on lavs (3) going through a mixer to one XLR camera input. Will this work better?

Here's what we did in TV news when you only had one camera man and one reporter. You stick with two mics. You put the wireless lav on your reader. You use your shoe mic for nat sounds like the kids reacting. It's the standard in the news industry when working with one camera and one reporter. If you really want the natsound mic always over the kids, then you can go wireless with that too and place it on a stand or suspend it over the location where you want to gather the sounds. If you really wanted try and have all three, you could do this.

1: wireless lav mic on subject
2: wireless suspended ambient mic over kids
3: natsot shoe mic that you switch out with the other two mics as needed (but that too is a pain because you will have to keep plugging in and unplugging.)

I say stick with the two mics, and remember the shoe mic is going to pick up the natsound that is in front of the camera, which is what you want.

I did this with a Canon XL2 because I wanted to run a natsound mic and a wireless at the same time, and record in 16bit.

It worked great. Though I have to admit I was going to split the tracks later, but never got around to figuring out how to do that in Permiere Pro. Make sure your editing program allows you to work with adjusting the levels in the different tracks, simpler programs don't do this. And it would be a waste of time to go through all the trouble of collecting the sound on different tracts, but never being able to edit them individually.

Good luck.

Alfred

When you say shoe mic, would that be a hyper cardioid? Or are they different? What's a shoe mic?

a mic on camera is NOT what you want to use for this at all. it'll pick up way too much room tone and slap. a on camera mic is good for crowd noise and other general ambience, not for getting clean dialog.

take ONE lav, place it on one of the two kids on the inside of them. if they are close to being shoulder to shoulder, the one mic will pic up both of them ok. yes the further kid will be a little lower but it will be ok. maybe it will also be the louder kid who is further away. put the other lav on the reader. done.

next option, lav the reader, cardiod on boompole for the kids if it clears the shots. as others have said, two lavs too close will phase each other for sure when mixed together.

Sorry about the confusing terminology.
By shoe mic, I mean the standard natsound mic on the camera.

Steve Oakley is right about the natsound mic picking up every bump on the camera, but as a professional you learn how to shoot and move without bumping. In five years of ENG (electronic news gathering), I would estimate that bumping effected less than 5 percent of the clips. But I don't want to get into an arguement about the effectiveness of the camera mic. The fact is, if you are shooting in more of a studio like setting (even if it's your living room), and you aren't moving the camera around, you do need to find a way to pick up everybody's sound.

But before you consider buying more sound equipment, I have to ask, why in the world are you using just one camera? As I understand it, you are going to be rolling on this storytime from start finish. How in the world are you going to get the camera from the subject to the cute faces of the children? You can't do it professionally with just one camera. You will have to stage your cutaways after the main part of the shooting. And often they won't match. I've been there, done that, won't work (that well). What I suggest, and I missed what type of camera you are using, is that you pick up a second camera to use as a basic wide shot, or a constant shot on the reader. With the second camera, you now have a chance to capture that third track of sound, maybe even a fourth.

I don't know what the finished product will look like. Maybe you could share. But it seems to me you need two cameras, and then you will have your extra sound track.

Alfred

There's really no way to boom this? Close as the subjects are to each other, I think a good boom op could cover it with a hypercardiod.

Trouble is, Lloyd doesn't want to use a boom operator. While a fixed boom could cover either the storyteller or the kids, just one really can't cover both at once. Now TWO hypers on booms might do it ...

I still like the idea of a lav on the storyteller and a boomed hyper on the kids, aimed at the quieter speaking of the two.

I'm actually using two cameras. I have one decent one and one so-so one. Cannon A1 and HV20. The A1 I have two tracks for audio via XLR, but I don't know how to get two on the HV20 since it's 1/8" line in. I wasn't really planning on using the HV20 to record the sound since it didn't have any XLRs in. I never really thought about it, but I suppose it could be done, right? 2 lines feeding into the A1 and one line into the HV20 and then I wouldn't need a mixer I guess, right?

I will post a picture of the proposed seating arrangements. I am with Steve that I think this is probably the best bet. Lav the adult who sits in the middle, and have the kids on two boom/hypers.

I think the HC20's external mic jack is accepts a stereo mic signal. If your mics have internal battery power, a Beachtek adapter or something like this Studio One unit http://trewaudio.com/store/product.p...&cat=31&page=1 would allow you to feed two XLR mics to your HV20 or you could probably just use a Y-cable such as this one http://trewaudio.com/store/product.p...&cat=31&page=1 ...

Adult in the middle on a sofa?. I was thinking of the kids side by side facing the storyteller, shoot in reverses so you have the adult in MCU cutting with reaction shots of the kids. Your line of action is drawn from the storytellers eyes to the kids eyes. Are you going to shoot in one take or try for multiple takes?

Very nice! Thanks for those links. That seems ideal. Running two cameras would get me 4 audio tracks, of which I only need 3. So I see this working great.

Steve, for this situation, if I were to go with your suggestions, what hypers would you recommend me buying? I think the best setup till now has been what you suggested--adult one lav, each kid with separate boomed hyper.

That's ONE option. I will post a picture link of the three different ones that we are thinking about.

1. Adult on the couch with one kid on same couch on either side--all looking toward cameras in front.
2. Adult on smaller lover chair with kids on rug in front FACING reader.
3. Adult on love chair, kids on either side with smaller chairs or bean bags at a 45-degree angle open to camera.

Multiple takes, I'm sure... One of the kids is 3, the other is 6... so getting it right on the first try is bound to be difficult.

So were you thinking then, since the kids would be shoulder to shoulder, ONE hyper for both?

As to specific mic suggestions, that's hard to do because so much depends on your budget and how serious an investment you want to make. The range that is available starts with something like the Oktava M012 at about $225 and ranges up to the Schoeps CMC641 or Neumann KM150 at around $2000 each. None of the ones I think of off the top of my head have internal batteries so that factors in too. The AKG SE300/CK93 modular combo is a very good, modestly priced mic that can be had in the $400 range. I wouldn't want to use it on a fishpole boom but stationary on a mic stand with a horizontal boom arm, the Rode NT3 has a nice sound.

If they're seated beside each other a single hyper would probably cover them. Seated a couple of feet apart it would be another story. The critical dialog is going to be the storyteller.

I would deffinatley use the HV20 to capture sound as well as video. I had a similar situation where I shot a concert with my 3-chip XL2, and had the wide establishing shot done with a one-chip ZR65 (both Canon cameras).

Both provided great sound. Both recorded in 16bit. There was some tone difference. But the only complaint I had was that the video on the one-chip ZR-65 left a lot to be desire, but the sound was great.

You might even be able to get away with using the built-in mic on the HV20 for all your ambient noise. Test it out and see if you like the ambient sound that it records.

I understand being on a budget and not wanting to spend the money on a boom pole, or someone to operate it. Not to mention that sometimes you just want to do it by yourself, maybe with a little help from family.

All I can say is test it out. I think with the two tracks on the A1 and the single track (possibly dual track) on the HV20, you should have it covered.

One more note: really light it well. Your HV20 will really start to look a lot grainier than the A1 as the light gets lower. So keep it really bright. If you really wanted to get the two cameras to match better, you could try to descrease the light in your A1 with the ND filter and up the gain. All this will do is reduce the quality of your picture. But if you have too much of a noticible difference between the two cameras, you may have to do it. It's your choice.

Alfred

Pictures of Layout
 

I have three conceptual layouts--numbered 1, 2, 3. Please keep in mind I did this in 15 mins with absolutely NO REGARD to aesthetic centering, cleaning, moving of things that won't be in the shots, exercise equipment, actual camera locations, lighting, furnishings, etc. etc. etc.... This is to simply provide a quick layout of the space and the conceptual positioning ideas for mics needed and their positioning.

The pics labeled "room dynamics" is just to get you an overall view of the room size and area to work with for equipment setup. Also, the wide-angle lens really distorts the true dimensions (20X18) , so please overlook that and all the above.

Here are the pictures: http://picasaweb.google.com/5014000

You might be able to use a studio mic such as the Rode NT2 which you can catch everyone with. You have to have the mic in a polar 8 pattern which catches all the voices around the mic. I'm sure you seen videos of people singing harmonies together in a circle around a microphone. Cardiod pattern only picks up the person in front of the mic.....it will pickup the others, but the hottest signal is in front of the mic. You would need a mic preamp to boost the mic's signal. So you would come from the mic into the mic pre and into the camera......or you could record into pro tools and then sync later. Since you record to disc you would have to record audio and video seperate and bring the audio into your video software. There has to be a way to get the audio from pro tools into premiere. There are plenty of mics out there for pretty reasonable and would sound fabulous for this type of application. You just have to make sure they have variable patterns. The Rode is around $400 I think and a decent mic pre you could get for $100-$500. You won't need a mic pre if you record into pro tools as it has mic pre's already. You might already know some of this information but I thought I would mention it if you didn't. I think using a mic in this situation would be extremely beneficial and would yield professional results. Keep in mind if you haven't used a mic like this before, that you will want to keep background noise to a minimum such as fans, washing machine, dogs barking etc. as it will pick up a lot of these sounds. Hope this helps. Peace.

Ira

Let me rephrase: The mic should be in omni mode which would pickup everything in a circular pattern.